The Nasty Party, Or One Bad Apple?

Earlier I cheekily blogged about the LibDems little local difficulties in Plymouth. Tonight, Cathy Newman (who we all call 'scoop' nowadays) has the story that the LibDem candidate for Stoke North has had to fall on his sword after sending racist emails. She says the content of the emails is 'unbroadcastable'.

Every party has its nutters. Every party has the odd racist, or homophobe. And when they are discovered they are kicked out, and quite right too. But just look back at LibDem Voice and look at the vicarious thrill they get when they discover a Labour or Tory candidate or politician who has done something like this. They write the story as if it is somehow representative of the whole party.

David Jack is not representative of the LibDems and I am happy to acknowledge that. But let's please have no more holier than thou stories from them about other parties being 'nasty'.

UPDATE: Here's the email. It is worth pointing out that David Jack denies sending it and is alleging that his email account was hacked into.

"...if I was you I would f*** back off to the hills of tora borro (sic), I have your home address, you are f***** sunshine, we shall see who has got balls now you two faced lying f****** paki... your cards f*****... prison awaits you b** boy. Think your (sic) brave, you don't know the line you have crossed you f*** witt (sic) - keep looking over you shoulder theif! (sic)"

Are the LibDems Becoming the Anti-Israel Party?

Both Labour and the Conservatives have pressure groups allied to their parties putting the causes of both Israel and Arab interests. Conservative Friends of Israel and Labour Friends of Israel compete (in a friendly manner, I should emphasise) with the Conservative Middle Eastern Council and Labour Friends of Palestine.

The LibDems also have a group called LibDem Friends of Palestine and a LibDem Friends of Israel. I imagine LDFI will want to have a word in the ear of LibDem maverick MEP Chris Davies, who has blogged his views on the current conflict...

It is time for Liberal Democrats to call a halt to the attempt to ride two horses and to try not to upset the Israeli lobby. Our support for the Palestinian cause is well enough known amongst those (by no means all!) in the Jewish community who will not countenance criticism of Israel. It is not well enough known amongst the majority who are appalled by Israel´s behaviour.

We should make clear that we will campaign tooth and nail for a viable and independent Palestinian state and will demand an end to deals with an Israeli government that bases its policy approach on a stance that is fundamentally racist.

Well, it's quite clear where he stands, but it's a disgrace that he calls the Israelis racist. You might expect him to be disowned by his leader. At least Ming Campbell had the guts to sack him from his position as leader of the LibDem MEPs when he told a jewish constituent she could wallow in her own filth after she complained he had likened Israel to the Nazis. Nice bloke, eh?

So LDFI has some work lobbying on its quite clear aims and objectives, among which are...

1. To influence the Party’s Middle East policy so it places a high priority on Israel’sright to peace and security.

2. To ensure Liberal Democrat parliamentarians are aware of the up-to-date situation in the Middle East.

3. To provide parliamentarians with briefing material for parliamentary debates, questions to Ministers and public appearances.

4. To rebut attacks on Israel in the media, Parliament and the Party.

They could start by countering Chris Davies's vile views. But they also have some work to do with their leader, Nick Clegg, if his comments yesterday were anything to go by, when he suggested that there should be an arms embargo on Israel.

*****

During an armed conflict like this, views become more polarised than ever. You pick your side, you makes your choice. But whichever side one falls down on, it does not hide the fact that virtually everyone agrees that the only long term solution is for a Palestinian State to be created to co-'exist peacefully alongside an Israeli State. But that cannot happen until both sides agree that the other has a right to exist. And Hamas (nor Hizbollah to the north) will never, ever do that. That's where the real issue lies. How can you negotiate with people whose goal is to destroy you? People often draw analogies with the IRA. The IRA was never out to destroy the British State - they had a cause which, whether you agreed with it or not - was over an issue on which you could - if you were preared to - negotiate. I cannot see how Israel can be expected to sit down to talk with people whose only goal in life is to encourage its destruction.

LibDems at Sea on Lisbon Treaty. Again.

The LibDems confirmed their status as the "right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing" party tonight in the Lisbon Treaty vote in the House of Lords. LibDem Peers delivered an embarrassing rebuff to Nick Clegg when instead of following the example of LibDems and abstaining on the idea of a referendum, they went through the No Lobby and voted against. The irony is that if they had abstained the Lords vote would have approved a referendum.

So for those already confused by the LibDem stance here's a three point outline of their stance...

2005 LibDem manifesto commits to a referendum
Jan 2008 LibDem MPs abstain on a referendum
May 2008 LibDem Peers vote against a referendum

Is this Nick Clegg demonstrating an ability to lead from the front? More like hiding behind Shirley Williams' skirt. Still, the Irish might yet put the LibDems out of their misery.

LibDems Caught Out Over Drafting Error

After their mass walkout over the EU Constitution, then Vince Cable's blunder at PMQSs last week, you might have thought that the LibDem whips would be doing their best to avoid any further procedural embarrassments in the House of Commons. Sadly it is not to be. In an astonishing blunder last week the LibDems put down a motion which effectively called for MORE noise pollution at Heathrow! They then tried to cover up their mistake by posting a slightly amended version of the motion on their website. In the website version they inserted the words “ending of”, thus completely turning around the meaning of the motion. Their website article then has the cheek to criticise MPs who did not support the motion!

The Liberal Democrats have misrepresented a motion that they tabled in parliament on their website, making it appear that they voted to support runway alternation at Heathrow, when they actually tabled and voted for a motion condemning runway alternation.

Norman Baker (Lewes) (LD): I beg to move,
That this House recognises the urgent need to curb carbon dioxide emissions to tackle climate change; condemns the Government for following policies that will instead lead to significant growth in emissions from the aviation sector; particularly condemns plans to allow a third runway at Heathrow; believes that the consultation paper Adding Capacity at Heathrow Airport was deeply flawed and is concerned at the undue influence BAA played in the drafting of the paper; notes that the paper significantly overstated the economic case for a third runway while greatly underplaying the serious environmental consequences, including, as well as the extra emissions from flights, the increase in intensity and distribution of noise for those living under the flight path through runway alternation and the threat of forced relocation for the inhabitants of Sipson village; and calls on the Government to withdraw permanently plans for a third runway at Heathrow, to keep the present cap of 480,000 flights per year as opposed to the 700,000 envisaged in the consultation document, to rule out any further increase in airport capacity in the South East, and to indicate to the aviation sector that it will have to live within its existing infrastructure capacity.
(Hansard: 2nd April 2008)

The text of the motion posted on the Liberal Democrats website...

That this House recognises the urgent need to curb carbon dioxide emissions to tackle climate change; condemns the Government for following policies that will instead lead to significant growth in emissions from the aviation sector; particularly condemns plans to allow a third runway at Heathrow; believes that the consultation paper Adding Capacity at Heathrow Airport was deeply flawed and is concerned at the undue influence BAA played in the drafting of the paper; notes that the paper significantly overstated the economic case for a third runway while greatly underplaying the serious environmental consequences, including, as well as the extra emissions from flights, the increase in intensity and distribution of noise for those living under the flight path through the ending of runway alternation and the threat of forced relocation for the inhabitants of Sipson village; and calls on the Government to withdraw permanently plans for a third runway at Heathrow, to keep the present cap of 480,000 flights per year as opposed to the 700,000 envisaged in the consultation document, to rule out any further increase in airport capacity in the South East, and to indicate to the aviation sector that it will have to live within its existing infrastructure capacity.

Oh dear.

Paddick Appoints US Internet Consulting Company

Mark Hanson's new PR/Media blog breaks the news that the Brian Paddick Mayoral campaign has appointed an American political consulting company to run its web operations. I think I am right in saying this is the first time a US consulting firm has been used in this manner in the UK, but I stand to be corrected. The company concerned is run by Democrat blogger Jerome Armstrong who is behind the MyDD blog (there's a joke there somewhere). He rose to fame, according to Mark Hanson, by playing a big part in the Howard Dean campaign in 2004. I spoke to Mark Pack, the LibDems Head of Innovations and he was duly fizzing with excitement about the appointment. If I were him, I would be too. However ... and you knew this was coming, didn't you?

I hadn't visited Brian Paddick's website until today and was rather underwhelmed with what I found. Go see for yourself. Paddick is a strong, potentially charismatic candidate. But his website is grey, weak and impersonal. It does nothing to promote Paddick as a unique personality. Ok, so you might argue, they have realised this and done something about it. True. But isn't it too late? There are only five weeks to go before polling day. Remember what Lynton Crosby once memorably said - you can't fatten a pig on market day.

But what does this development say about the future of internet campaigning? Well firstly it exposes the lack of any British political consulting firms specialising in internet politics. Yes, there are a few web design companies, but no one who will grab a campaign by the scruff of a keyboard. This is not surprising. We don't have either the number of campaigns or the budgets of American politics to finance expensive consultants. If you look at the website of US internet campaign consultants you can see literally dozens of campaigns they have worked on. That just couldn't happen here.

I think the appointment of Jerome Armstrong may be a little bit too late to have a huge impact on the Paddick campaign, but I suspect it will lead to many more such arrangements between UK political parties and US political internet consulting firms.

Notes from the LibDem Spring Conference

* Nick Clegg tried to do a Cameron and speak without notes during his wind-up speech at the LibDem Spring Conference today, yet people present spotted autocues ... just in case.

* Conference goers were none too impressed by BBC Political Correspondent, John Pienaar, who didn't fancy joining the LibDems on the conference shuttle bus (who can blame him) which took the bearded ones from the main hotel to the conference centre. Instead, Pienaar opted for a taxi. Good man.

* Liverpool City Council Cabinet member Colin Eldridge, who owns a laundry business in the City, was allegedly spotted urging delegates staying at the Crowne Plaza Hotel, the official conference hotel, to make full use of their hotel towels. His company coincidentally does the hotel's laundry. Nice to see the LibDems full of the entrepreneurial spirit! However, he lists himself as a member of Friends of the Earth in his online biog. Obviously he doesn't go along with all these pesky signs in hotel bedrooms urging people to 'think of the environment' before using more towels!

* Photographers at the Crowne Plaza Hotel tried in vain to get a picture of Nick Clegg standing by a rather hideous statue in the entrance lobby of the Crowne Plaza. The name of the statue? Fallen Angel...

Thanks to my undercover reporter in Liverpool for these snippets.

UPDATE: I was going to attempt to Fisk Nick Clegg's speech, but since Cranmer has done it already, I won't bother. It really was a bizarre experience, full of contradictions and odd assertions.

LibDems Face Double Whammy Brown Fine

The spectre of jailed fraudster Michael Brown has returned to haunt the LibDems, who, according to Scotland on Sunday may not only have to repay the £2.4 million they took from him, but may also face a £2.4 million fine from the Electoral Commission. It's difficult to see how on earth they would be able to find £4.8 million without going under. Surprising thought it may seem, this is not something I would welcome. These are the main bits of the Scotland on Sunday story...

The Liberal Democrats are facing a potentially ruinous bill of up to £4.8m after taking donations from a crooked Scots businessman, Scotland on Sunday can reveal. Party funding watchdogs last night confirmed that the impact of Charles Kennedy's decision to accept £2.4m from Michael Brown could be doubled if the Lib Dems have to pay back the entrepreneur's former business associates, as well as a matching "fine" imposed as a punishment for accepting the cash. The Electoral Commission is set to order the party to return the 2005 donation amid suspicions that Brown's company was not doing business in the UK at the time of the payment, making it impermissible under funding rules. But, rather than going back to Brown, the £2.4m would have to be paid as a "fine" into the Consolidated Fund, the government's Bank of England account.

To make matters worse, a group of millionaires who invested in the company, 5th
Avenue Partners Ltd, insist the money is theirs and have demanded repayment-
meaning the Lib Dems will have to find another £2.4m on top of the fine imposed
for taking the cash. A senior source at the commission last night confirmed they were considering using their full powers against the party, which is already more
than £1m in the red. The double demand could force Lib Dem chiefs to go cap-
in-hand to the party membership for extra contributions of at least £50-£60 per
person. The Electoral Commission source said: "There is a double jeopardy
element in this situation. If the commission rules that the donation must be
returned, it clearly cannot go back to the donor himself, so it must be paid into the consolidated fund. The demands of creditors or investors would be completely separate to that and up to the party to settle independently." The Brown donation, the biggest-ever received by the Liberal Democrats, has been subject to intense scrutiny since former leader Kennedy gratefully accepted it as a huge contribution to the £4.9m cost of running the party's 2005 election campaign. Although little was known about the Majorca-based tycoon, it later emerged that he was born in a run-down part of Glasgow's West End and ended up in Majorca after making a £10m fortune from property deals and City trading. But holes in Brown's story began appearing under closer inspection soon after details of his financial support were revealed. The High Court ruled that his company was fraudulent and had never traded, he was extradited from Spain and jailed for two years last September after admitting perjury and a passport offence. Lawyers for Martin Edwards, former Manchester United chairman, two Chinese tycoons and an American lawyer have since written to the party saying they believe that the money is theirs.

Last week, Brown was charged with 18 further offences including money
laundering and theft. Brown will also face allegations of perverting the course
of justice and fraud. The donation was part of an investigation by City of
London Police into allegations of a £45m high-yield fraud. He is the subject of
an international money-laundering investigation by police as well as facing
civil action by the HSBC bank. The donations have exposed the Lib Dems to
ridicule and recriminations from opponents who believe Brown's intervention gave
them an unfair advantage during the 2005 election.

A Lib Dem spokeswoman last night confirmed they had been made aware of the
"double jeopardy" threat hanging over the party's head. She added: "Our legal
advice is robust and on the basis of this our auditors advised that we need not
make provision for any repayments. "The party acted in good faith at all
times in relation to these donations, which were properly spent on the Westminster general election campaign two years ago."

I do not deny that the LibDems acted in good faith, but in issues like this, it's not enough. They clearly didn't do the requisite due diligance and that, I believe, will be at the core of the Electoral Commission's findings. I do believe they should pay the money back, but I do not believe they should face a £2.4 million fine as well.

Lessons in LibDem Telephone Canvassing

We're only a week in to the Welsh and Scottish election campaigns and already the LibDems are looking, well, just that little bit desperate. Take this email which was sent out this morning begging their supporters in London to go into their Cowley Street call centre to call people in Scotland and Wales...

Not winning where you are? Help Wales and Scotland to win!

It is only five weeks before the elections to the Scottish Parliament and Welsh Assembly. The importance of these elections cannot be overstated. In Scotland we being squeezed on all fronts and the SNP’s polls are looking impressive. In Wales we are facing intense opposition from Plaid Cymru and Labour. On Tuesday nights we are telephone canvassing for Wales and Scotland from Cowley Street from 7pm onwards. It really is very easy to do and requires no knowledge of either situation. Just dial and ask how people are going to vote.

If you can help please contact Andrew F (xxxx@parliament.uk) or Sarah G (xxxx@parliament.uk). We really do need the help so if you can spare an hour then it would be appreciated.

Is it really appopriate for parliamentary email addresses to be used for overt party political electioneering? I think not. I can't get very excited about that, but it is very revealing that people are being told that telephone canvassing requires no knowledge of either situation. presumably because the instruction is that you just 'tell 'em what they wanna hear'.

Brown Scandal Returns to Haunt LibDems

If the LibDems thought that the Michael Brown scandal had gone away this morning's Times will have given them a jolt. A pensioner is claiming that the £155,000 he gave to Michael Brown to invest for him, actually ended up in LibDem coffers. It has also emerged that the LibDems' second biggest donor, Paul Strasburger, is funding Michael Brown's legal fees. The stories are HERE and HERE. Meanwhile the Electoral Commission investigation into the admissability of Brown's loan awaits the verdict of the City of London Police.

Not, of course, that this has anything to do with the LibDems at all. No, Sirree. Never let it be said. Whiter than white. Yellower than yellow [enough - ed].

Stephen Tall on the Ming Speech Fallout

Stephen Tall is a Liberal blogger I hugely respect. Yes he's partisan, but aren't we all. But often he gives a really good - and independent - insight into an issue which the LibDems are struggling with. His analysis of the fallout from Ming's conference speech is spot on. Here's an extract...

Tempting as it is to scapegoat a feral press officer, the lessons from the
last week need also to be learned by those higher up. It was not Mr Littlewood
who first started speculating about the possibility of a Hung Parliament: it was
Sir Menzies in his pre-conference interview with The Times’s Peter Riddell.

And it was not Mr Littlewood’s speech which clumsily set out five tests for Labour’s Gordon Brown to prove his prime ministerial worthiness, but scornfully dismissed David Cameron’s Tories in just three words. The media can hardly be blamed for inferring that equidistance is no longer the cri de coueur of the Lib Dems. That this seemed to take the party leadership by surprise is not to their credit. It is also bad politics: as potential king-makers, it’s extra-important the party should keep, and should appear to be keeping, its options open.

Let’s remember that in Saturday’s Trident debate Sir Menzies urged the party not to commit Britain to unilateral disarmament: to do so, delegates were warned, would undermine this country’s negotiating position. I agree. Real brinksmanship requires studied neutrality.

I have largely exculpated the media of blame for the hole the Lib Dems dug ourselves last Sunday. But this debacle highlights how good political reporting has been sacrificed at the altar of fast political reporting. Once upon a time, a politician made a speech, and it was reported verbatim. Thankfully those times are long gone. This gave way to the reporting of speeches accompanied by some contextual analysis. Then, with the pressure of the rolling news agenda, copy was distributed to the media in advance of a speech. And now, not only are speeches distributed in advance, but the media allows itself to be briefed on what are the key passages, and what the speaker really means by this or that sentence. The result is that the media has given up listening to the content of speeches, or analysing them with detached objectivity: instead, all is viewed through the prism of the briefing. Journalists’ deadlines are more frenetic than ever: anything that isn’t encapsulated within the ‘Breaking News’ ticker-tape is old news. Being first matters more than being right. Sunday’s debacle was wholly avoidable; that it wasn’t avoided is the Lib Dems’ fault, and our problem. But it also says much about today’s political climate - the interaction of journalists, media officers and politicians - that what controversy there was at conference centred not on the policies passed, but rather on a disputed
behind-the-scenes briefing about a speech.

You can read the whole post HERE. Jonny Wright also has a good post on the subject of the LibDems and a hung Parliament.

Tory MP Admits to Wanting to Snog Sir Ming

THIS article by Tory MP Paul Goodman reveals a love that dare not speak its name.

Ming's Unhappy Anniversary Approaches...

Michael Gove has written a superb piece in this week's Spectator on the failures of Ming Campbell's first year as LibDem leader. You can read the whole article HERE, but here are some highlights...

It is striking that the eclipse of the Liberal Democrats should coincide with Ming’s accession to the leadership. He is, in a way, the purest living embodiment in British politics of the Peter Principle — the law which dictates that people will rise just one level above their natural slot in life, to a position in which their weaknesses are then cruelly exposed.
As deputy leader of the Liberal Democrats, Ming had found his metier. He was the Sergeant Wilson to Charles Kennedy’s Captain Mainwaring — the suave, classier, better-educated number two whose dry style left everyone wondering how on earth he put up serving with under his chaotic superior. If Ming had never challenged for the leadership, everyone would have agreed that it was a tragedy he’d never enjoyed the top job. But now that he actually has the leadership, a very different sort of tragedy is playing itself out.
The pity is that the Liberal Democrats, having once enjoyed a reputation for innovation and creativity, should have embarked, under Ming, on the policy equivalent of a long mid-afternoon snooze. The Lib Dems were once the party you went to for environmental dynamism, but just as the nation has woken up to the scale of the crisis, it’s the Conservatives who are displaying the boldest and most creative thinking in this area. And it’s not just on green issues that the third party is feeling its age. Whether it’s social justice, where the Tunbridge Wells MP Greg Clark has done more to focus attention on inequality than any other opposition MP, or civil liberties, where Dominic Grieve and David Davis are the opponents Labour fear, traditional areas of Liberal Democrat strength have been taken over by the Tories. Take a gander at the Lib Dem party website and you’ll find that all its spokesmen’s statements are reactions to what the other parties are doing — with scarcely a fresh idea from one month to the next.
Tragically, and this is Ming’s fourth misfortune, the Lib Dems have retreated to their comfort zone, attempting to recreate the warm glow they felt when they were marching arm-in-arm with the SWP against the Iraq war, by making their strongest pitch on foreign policy. In the recent debate on Iraq Ming spoke with a forceful eloquence which will have reminded fans of his golden era, but the content of what he said soon fell apart under scrutiny. His demand that British troops withdraw to meet an arbitrary timetable was widely recognised as militarily naive. But, worse than that, for the party of Gladstone, Ming’s insistence on rapid withdrawal would leave Iraq’s liberals and democrats to the wolves. How ethical is a foreign policy which, when it sees trade unionists and feminists fighting clerical fascists, decides that the best thing to do is to give the clerical fascists a freer hand?
But then Ming’s whole approach to foreign policy is neither liberal nor particularly democratic. Discussing the wider Middle East, his only comment on Syria was a demand that the Golan Heights be returned to Syrian control, in order to satisfy the amour-propre of the ruling Assad dynasty. The part Syria has played in de-stabilising Lebanon’s nascent democracy, and its role in the murder of Rafiq Hariri, were ignored. On the Middle East peace process itself, Ming argued that the main obstacle to peace was the fact that ‘on both sides of the aisle in the US Congress, there is almost uncritical support for Israel’.
There may well be a place in British politics for a party which argues for greater concessions to Baathist tyranny and believes there is a malign Zionist lobby controlling American foreign policy, but one had rather hoped George Galloway had cornered the market. That the leader of the Liberal Democrats should enjoy what most acknowledge to be his finest hour as leader, making these sort of arguments just shows how far gone things are.

Ouch.

UPDATE: I have just received my daily email from the LibDems. In his article Michael Gove says: "Take a gander at the Lib Dem party website and you’ll find that all its spokesmen’s statements are reactions to what the other parties are doing — with scarcely a fresh idea from one month to the next." As if to prove Michael Gove's point the LibDem email contains eleven stories, each one of which "criticises", "condemns" in one form or another. Not a single one of the stories says anything original at all.

I Agree With Lord Rennard

Lord Rennard has just described the appointment of Jonathan Oates as the Party's new Director of Policy and Communications as "one of the toughest jobs in British politics". He's not wrong.

The Price of a Coalition

Mike Smithson of PoliticalBetting.com has written a fascinating WHAT IF style article on the result of the next election HERE on ConservativeHome this morning. Like me, he thinks a hung Parliament is the most likely result of the next election. He believes Gordon Brown would form a minority adminstration which would be voted down on the Queen's Speech. He further speculates that David Cameron would then form his own minority administration but offer the LibDems enough to keep them from voting down a Queen's Speech. He thinks a formal Con-Lib pact is unlikely.

I must say that all my conversations with LibDem friends in Parliament suggest that is true. They say they would not entertain a formal pact without a commitment to electoral reform. For most Conservatives it is inconceivable that they would support any move to elect the House of Commons by any form of PR - myself included. I can, however, see merit in a second chamber and local councils being elected under a different electoral system to first past the post. But in itself, even if that were to be on offer from the Conservatives I suspect the LibDems would indulge in a bit of cutting off of noses.

One thing is sure, as the election comes ever closer, these debates will gather momentum.